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Author Archives: Ariel
“Forget Freytag’s Pyramid (of Predictable Male Prose)—behold Gore’s Upside Down Triangle (of Fierce Feminist Narrative)! We Were Witches is its own genre, in its own canon.”
—”Kate Schatz, author of Rad American Women A-Z
Ariel Gore’s We Were Witches is one woman’s body refusing to become property, refusing to be overwritten by law or traditions, one woman’s body cutting open a hole in culture so that actual bodies might emerge. A triumphant body story. A singularly spectacular siren song.
—Lidia Yuknavitch
Ariel Gore’s We Were Witches is both magical and punk rock—the way it takes traditional values and traditional story structure to task, the way Gore’s protagonist, Ariel, uses witchy intelligence to resist a system totally against her.
—Michelle Cruz Gonzales
We Were Witches seizes the shame and hurt internalized by young women and turns it into magic art and poetry. Ariel Gore’s writing is a diamond pentacle carved into a living heart, transforming singular experience into universal knowledge.”
—Susie Bright
An incisive and engaging work of literary genius that never loses heart. Gore speaks with the brazen and tender voice of a neglected, hidden generation about hidden and vulnerable truths.
—Lasara Firefox Allen
We Were Witches is raw and truthful, painfully funny, inspiring of outrage, and alive with the wonder and magic of a feminist awakening. One single mom becoming woke, struggling, and triumphing on her own outsider terms, We Were Witches is a new feminist classic, penned by one of the culture’s strongest authors at her most experimental and personal.
—Michelle Tea
Ask for We Were Witches wherever you buy books. Here are links to Bookshop.org and Amazon.
New classes
It’s time to sign up for new online creative writing classes with Ariel Gore.
“Do You Have Beau?” – new Sunday essay in the Rumpus
Shame is the haunting that’s hardest to scrub away.
New creative writing classes
It’s time to sign up for new online creative writing classes with Ariel Gore. Find out more and register at The Literary Kitchen.
The Stranger’s Plot – new Essay in The Nervous Breakdown
The new arrivals drive Priuses and can be seen running fast back and forth, up and down the street carrying hand weights.
An old musician neighbor of mine yells out her window at them, “You can relax! You’ve already made it to the top!â€
But they don’t seem to hear her.
Blood-Red Bougainvillea – new Sunday essay in the Rumpus
I imagined my Gammie on the other end of the phone, her grey hair piled into a bun, a red silk scarf tied around it, her red-manicured nails clutching a Vodka tonic. Her skin was slightly darker than the rest of the women in our family, so she always joked about the milkman. “I can’t stand it,†she sighed now. “I’m the last Democrat in Orange County.â€
I held the receiver away from my mouth so my Gammie wouldn’t hear the inhale and exhale of my cigarette.
“Darling,†she said. “You’re doing a marvelous job–as well as anyone could do–but children need fathers, don’t you agree?â€
The End of Eve
“The End of Eve had just about everything I ever want in a memoir: WTF plot events, almost-over-the-top characters that you never doubt are real, gorgeous and breathtaking moments of introspection, and wry humor.â€
—Book Riot
“How Ariel puts human tenderness on the page is an act of poetry damn close to sublime.â€
—Tom Spanbauer
“An experienced journalist and writer across genre, Gore’s prose is both eloquent and spare. Ultimately, The End of Eve is Gore’s story—an account of the imaginative strategies she employs to survive and create—in which she demonstrates how, much of the time, for her anyway, surviving and creating are one and the same.â€
—Los Angeles Review of Books
You can buy all of Ariel Gore’s books from your local independent bookseller or from Powell’s.
Or listen to the audio version–read by the author.
Subscribe for Saturday morning writing prompts
Wake up and write! Now you can subscribe to Ariel Gore’s School for Wayward Writers and get weekly writing prompts. You’ll get a new writing assignment / writing prompt emailed to you every Saturday morning. Easy and affordable way to keep your writing practice fresh. $5 a month. Cancel any time.
The End of Eve wins New Mexico – Arizona Book Award
Ariel Gore’s darkly comic memoir, The End of Eve, just won a 2014 New Mexico – Arizona book award. You can get a signed copy right here. $16.95. FREE SHIPPING.
“It turns out that both life and art are balancing acts. In one as in the other, Gore seems to be saying that even as we acknowledge past traumas, we cannot let those wounds dictate our actions in the present. The End of Eve is a product of bravery, love, and hard-won wisdom. In sharing it, Ariel Gore invites her reader to bask in the light she has found.” —Los Angeles Review of Books